


amnesia

by cautiouslyoptimistic



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:55:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23238061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cautiouslyoptimistic/pseuds/cautiouslyoptimistic
Summary: she saw it coming—or, kara loses her memories after an accident but somehow can't seem to forget lena
Relationships: Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor
Comments: 39
Kudos: 1424





	amnesia

She saw it coming—

_—bright, green, massive. A shout to move. The thundering of a heart. The, the, the—_

She saw it coming.

She’d never paid much attention to human idioms. There were so many, every language and people with their own, garnering wide eyes and blinked shock when she got her idioms mixed up, sometimes even combining them with phrases she’d heard on Krypton. (She’d come to accept that they’d die, those phrases unique to her people _._ She’d learned that Kal-El couldn’t possibly understand them, never having seen the deep red of her sun or experienced the jokes within the different Guilds, and despite her best efforts to explain, merely smiled kindly and nodded, a faraway look in his eyes—confused and aching for a home he’d never know.)

No. She’d never paid attention to human phrases. It seemed moot, for the most part. Krypton would die with her, and bumbling through her idioms as Alex patiently listened without understanding felt a little bit like she was keeping _something_ of her home planet alive.

But there was one—

She saw it coming. Bright, green, massive. It’d blinded her and the force of it pushed the air out of her lungs, left her grasping at phantom images as the darkness overtook her.

She saw it coming, and her life—what was the human phrase? What did they say when they pressed hands to their chests, breathing heavily, the slightest bit of relief tinting their voice as they spoke…?

What was it?

(She saw it coming. It came rushing at her like a colossal storm—fast, catastrophic, _heavy_.

She saw it coming and she hadn’t moved out of the way.)

She saw her life flash before her eyes.

_Bright, green—no._

_Her mother in a blue dress, her father’s form fitting uniform, the scent of Krypton’s afternoon, the kindness in Eliza’s eyes, the gentle warmth of Alex’s embrace—the tenor of her voice, the grip of her hand._

_Chocolate pecan pie. Ocean air. The crashing waves and Jeremiah’s comforting presence._

_CatCo and the S and Cat’s advice._

_James and the smell of his cologne, his beautiful smile._

_Lena. Rao,_ Lena _._

(She saw her life flash before her eyes, yes, that was the phrase.

She saw, she saw, she saw….)

She saw death coming.

(Bright, green, massive, a shout to move, the thundering of a heart—her heart? she wasn’t sure—the flashes of a life she could’ve had, would’ve had, _should’ve had_.)

Kara saw death coming, and she stood her ground anyway.

x

She woke underneath a sunlamp, heart pounding vigorously away, as if attempting to prove a point. She bit her lip, stretching a little, and then sat up slowly, wincing at the ache in her bones and muscles, grimacing as she caught sight of her bare arms and legs and the gashes and bruises that marred her skin. 

It took her a moment, but she eventually managed to swing her legs around the bed, getting to her feet gingerly as she looked around. She was in an unfamiliar room, full of unfamiliar scents (coffee, gun powder, disinfectant), the gentle hum of voices from beyond the room making her wonder if she was in a hospital of some kind.

(But then what sort of hospital would keep a sunlamp on hand? Where were the doctors, the nurses, the humans bustling about with their oh so fragile bodies?

More to the point, what sort of hospital knew she didn’t need treatment—knew that a bit of sun could cure anything?

What sort of hospital smelled of _gunpowder_?)

For the first time, she took notice of the signs of life in her room. A jacket hung over a chair, a matted pillow against the armrest—as if someone had slept by her bedside in a very uncomfortable position. Coffee cups littered about, a stack of neatly folded clothes sitting on the corner of the table in the back, folders and newspapers and a laptop that was halfway shut.

Kara shuffled over, flipping through the papers, frowning at the figures and memos and stock prices, pausing only when her eyes fell on a newspaper that was shoved unceremoniously in the trash.

There, in full color on the front page, was a photo of _Kara_ , wearing a suit remarkably similar to Kal-El’s, their family’s crest displayed proudly on her chest as she stood tall, hands braced on her hips.

And the headline: _Supergirl’s Status Still Unknown After Attack._

(Bright, green, massive—)

Kara promptly passed out.

x

Alex was sitting in the chair when Kara came to, once again laying beneath a sunlamp, skin unblemished and only the remnants of an ache in her bones.

“God, Kara,” Alex said a little breathlessly, getting to her feet and pressing down on Kara’s shoulders, stopping her from sitting up. It wasn’t hard at all to sit up anyway. “I thought we had a talk about you not scaring me to death,” she continued, the joke falling flat as relief and fear bled into her tone.

“What is this place?” Kara asked, looking around for her glasses as she spoke. “And why are you dressed like that?”

“This is my uniform, I always wear it,” Alex mumbled uncertainly, taking several steps back and looking down at herself in confusion. “What are you looking for?”

“My glasses, have you seen them?”

“They’re with your extra suit at the apartment—Kara? What are you doing?”

Kara stopped blindly reaching out around her as she pushed herself off the bed, her legs shaky beneath her, turning to her sister in confusion.

“Anyone could walk in, Alex,” she whispered, resisting the urge to listen in on what was going on outside the room, wishing for her glasses to tune out all the extraneous noise. It was harder to pretend she didn’t have powers without her glasses.

“So?”

“So, aren’t they going to wonder how I can see without my glasses or hear—”

“—Kara, what are you—” but Alex’s interruption was cut off by the door flying open, a woman with dark hair strolling into the room. Her eyes were on her phone, a jacket slung over her arm, heels clapping against the tiled floor.

“—I called Jess to postpone my meetings, so I can stay with Kara while you go get something to eat,” she said without looking up. “And you _need_ something to eat, Alex.”

“Lena,” Alex tried, looking between Kara and this Lena character apprehensively. “I think—”

“Don’t argue, you haven’t taken a moment’s break since the attack, you—” Lena finally looked up from her phone, meeting Kara’s eyes first, a smile appearing on her face so quickly that it gave Kara whiplash. “Kara! You’re awake!” She dropped her jacket in shock, but before she could rush towards Kara—who was edging away, still looking around for her glasses—Alex stepped between them.

“Lena, I don’t know—”

“—you were supposed to call me the second Kara woke up—”

“Lena—”

“Alex?” Kara interrupted, swallowing hard at the expression on the dark-haired woman’s face, the utter joy—the tears that began forming in her eyes. “Who is this?” 

Lena froze. Alex coughed. Kara squirmed.

“Right,” Alex said slowly, looking at Lena rather than Kara. “Apparently there’s been some kind of side effect.”

x

She’d been poked and prodded and asked dozens of questions before she’d finally been left to her own devices, once again completely alone in the room with the sunlamp.

The extra set of clothes, the coffee cups, the papers and folders, the laptop… _everything…_ was removed from the room, leaving it bare and empty—all signs of life gone. She hadn’t been allowed a phone—“No, Kara, you can’t call Cat Grant. Trust me, she doesn’t need you right now”—and even the newspaper she’d tried to sneak by had been confiscated. She had, however, been given a pair of glasses, Alex mumbling something about Maggie having picked it up, wincing when Kara asked who Maggie was and why Alex blushed so deeply when Kara wondered why Maggie had a spare key to Alex’s apartment.

The confinement and the confusion drove Kara mad—dwelling incessantly on the blank look in Lena’s eyes when Kara asked who she was—but before Kara could consider the pros and cons of breaking herself out of the strange place, Jeremiah’s instructions to never use her powers be damned, she began to hear voices from down the hall.

She agonized for a moment, wondering what Jeremiah would say if he was still here, then stopped actively trying to shut the world out.

(She could hear the squealing of tires from down the street, a young woman crying in a bathroom at a law office several blocks away, two little boys laughing as they chased each other during recess.

It took her a moment, unused to noise, unused to the sensory overload, but she finally managed to hone in on the voices down the hall, recognizing Alex’s first.)

“—leave her in there,” Alex was saying, sounding thoroughly exhausted and more than a little worried. “Kara’s not patient, she won’t wait around forever.”

“I want to help her as much as you do, Alex,” a deeper, clearly male voice, cut in. “But I have experience with memory loss and the mind and exposing her to everything before she’s ready could be damaging and have lasting effects—not only may she never get all her memories back, she might never be the same at all.”

“But Alex is right, J’onn,” a third voice—the one belonging to the dark-haired woman, Lena—added softly, something about her tone making Kara feel…guilty. She wanted nothing more than to break down the door and hug Lena, make her smile, and she couldn’t understand why she’d feel so strongly about someone she didn’t even know. “Unless you’re suggesting locking Kara up for the foreseeable future, we’re going to have to tell her the basics. Don’t you think that she should learn about the memories she’s missing from us, her friends and family, and not a trashy magazine article?”

“We could monitor her, keep her away from—”

“—you’re suggesting babysitting, and it’s not going to work” Alex interrupted, tone hard. “Besides, even if James could keep an eye on her at all times while she’s at CatCo, what about the evenings? What about the DEO?”

“I agree with Alex, she’s not a child,” Lena said softly. “We could tell her the basics and then for everything else…just wait until she asks? Do you think that would protect her mind, J’onn?”

“It could work,” he muttered, sounding more than a little resigned. “I suppose it’s better than keeping her locked up. But here’s the question: what are the basics?”

“I say we stick to work,” Lena answered immediately. “We tell her about CatCo, we tell her about Supergirl, and everything else…we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

“And what about you, Lena?” Alex asked, adding something else in a mumble, soft enough that Kara couldn’t make out all the words, followed by the sound of shuffling paper, a sigh, and then footsteps heading towards her door.

She blinked when the door opened and Alex approached her immediately, taking her hands and squeezing gently, while Lena leaned against the back wall with her eyes determinedly set on the floor. A man with serious eyes closed the door behind him, standing in front of it with his arms crossed over his chest, something about his stance vaguely familiar. Kara assumed he was J’onn.

“Right. Okay, so I’m sure you have a lot of questions,” Alex began, eyes darting towards J’onn. She smiled a little when Kara nodded furiously. “Here’s the thing, Kara, we’re not exactly sure what’s happened to you.”

“I don’t understand.”

“What Alex is saying, Miss Danvers,” J’onn said, “is that we need time.”

“If you’re asking me to stay in this room—” Kara began hotly, wondering what could’ve happened in the two seconds it took for them to reach her door for their argument to come to a totally different conclusion.

“No, we’re asking that you keep a low profile.” 

“A low profile?” Kara repeated incredulously, frowning as Alex motioned for Kara to follow her. She stepped out of her room for the first time, feeling uncertain as she took in her surroundings. It was obvious, as she stared at men and women with guns strapped to their legs rush about, that she was _not_ in a hospital. Alex smiled at her obvious discomfort, clearly attempting to put her at ease, though her rapid heartbeat and nervous expression wasn’t doing much to help Kara remain calm.

She led Kara down to the ground floor, motioning towards the letters under their feet, smiling a little.

“Welcome to the DEO,” she said, gesturing to aliens walking across the breezeway, the weaponry that was being tested down a hallway, the training exercises several agents were being led through by a stern looking, short haired woman, and the researchers and scientists who were studying clumps of green goo in some sort of lab.

Kara blinked and for the second time in a single day, she promptly passed out.

x

_Bright, green, and massive,_ that’s all she was aware of as she stared death down.

She could hear shouting behind her, civilians she hoped that Alex had managed to corral into some sort of shelter. She could smell blood (her blood? she wasn’t sure, it’d been so long since she bled) on her skin, feel the trembling of the ground beneath her feet as the bomb—the weapon Cadmus had created for the sole purpose of attempting to rid the world of the Girl of Steel—ticked away, inching closer and closer to detonation. 

Bright, green, and massive.

(She didn’t have time to wonder where the kryptonite came from, didn’t have a moment to hope Clark was a long ways gone by now—that he wouldn’t have a chance to return, to remove this burden from her shoulders, attempting to protect her once again, not knowing she never wanted his protection, still didn’t want it.

She didn’t have time to hope that J’onn had gotten Lena out, that James and Winn were still huddled in an alleyway several blocks away, tending to the young woman that warned them about the bomb.

She didn’t—she didn’t have time to second guess, to think, to take a breath.)

_Bright, green, and massive._

She carried it over her head, only thought to get away, away, far from her friends and family—from the city she loved so much.

Her vision blurred.

She released the bomb, and then, _pain_.

And then…

Darkness.

x

When she opened her eyes, she was met with the sight of her own bedroom. There was an empty coffee cup on her nightstand, right next to a partially broken alarm clock, her glasses hanging precariously off the edge of the table.

As she sat up she was gratified to notice that the coffee cup was the only thing out of place—her clothes were still scattered around her room, her sheets were still the light blue she’d had since moving in, her pillows smelled like her own shampoo.

She allowed herself a smile, glad that it’d all just been a bad dream, her relief promptly stamped out as the door to her bedroom swung open and Alex strode in wearing the skin tight black uniform she’d been wearing in Kara’s nightmare.

“Ready for your first day back at work?” Alex asked cheerfully, tossing Kara a bag filled with doughnuts.

Kara took the doughnuts with a sigh and carefully pretended not to notice the bag full of framed pictures hanging from Alex’s shoulder.

(She pretended not to notice that Alex missed one, the photo capturing what seemed for the most part, a normal moment: takeout boxes on the coffee table, Alex and another woman sitting closely together on the couch, and Kara gazing at Lena, a soft smile on her lips, and Lena gazing back.

Instead, she tucked the photo safely into a drawer, her eyes lingering on Lena, feeling as though she was missing something obvious—something extraordinary.)

x

“Right, so here’s a basic rundown of what you missed,” Winn said, turning around in his seat and looking at Kara. He was smiling wide, looking a lot more cheerful than felt appropriate. If he wasn’t the only person other than Alex that Kara actually remembered, she would’ve avoided him entirely. “You caught a plane, you wore my suit, Cat named you, you saved National City, Cat gave you a promotion and then skedaddled right out of there, and now Snapper hates you even though you’re one of his best reporters.”

“None of that made sense,” Kara managed, choosing to stare out the window than meet Winn’s eyes. She didn’t like all the uncertainty, all the _unknowns_. After all, she hadn’t felt this way since first landing on Earth and dealing with a new world, with new people and customs and life. It was stressful and frustrating—everything at once felt totally the same and completely different, leaving her lost and insecure and uncomfortable.

Uncomfortable enough that she’d agreed to let Alex drive her to work, despite hating the enclosed space.

“Don’t worry about it, Kara,” Alex said soothingly, the click of her turn signal beginning to drive Kara mad. “James will be with you at CatCo and you know you can call me anytime, right?”

“Right,” she repeated flatly, knowing without looking that Winn and Alex had just exchanged a long, significant look, clearly unsure how to deal with her. 

“We’re going to figure this out,” Alex swore as she pulled up at CatCo, grabbing Kara’s hand before she could slip out of the car without another word. “This is only temporary.”

Kara swallowed hard, straightened her glasses, and pulled her hand away, giving Alex a tight smile and nod, for the first time in her life, uncertain about her sister’s faith.

After all, Kara knew her sister better than anyone—she could hear minute uptick of Alex’s heart rate with the lie.

x

She stumbled through her day at CatCo, but James—tall, handsome, and Clark’s friend, grinning when he told her he knew about her secret and that they were good friends—assured her that it was normal enough, that she had done great. Other than look at her oddly when she nodded one too many times, Snapper (an unfortunately grumpy and _mean_ man) hadn’t seemed like he noticed anything out of the ordinary, and a few of the other reporters offered her a smile and claimed they were happy she got over her flu.

Her first attempt at being Supergirl didn’t go quite as well.

(She’d forgotten how to fly, made silly mistakes, crashed twice into the desert as she overshot her destination.

She landed on the cover of several papers and magazines the next day, some cheerfully welcoming Supergirl back, glad she was alive, others wondering if she’d come back to work too early, concerned about her ‘state of mind.’)

By the end of her first day back among the living—as Winn had put it, apologizing when Alex glared at him—Kara felt a little better, a little more settled. Everything was still new, but she’d spent much of her lunch break scrolling through article after article about Supergirl, piecing that part of her life together. And Winn was remarkably helpful in telling her every little thing that had happened at CatCo before he left for the DEO fulltime.

And yet, something was missing…something felt off.

But with no way to fix it, no way to understand it, Kara resigned herself to ignoring it as best she could—spending the entirety of her night in the sky.

x

The first time she ran into Lena since waking up at the DEO, exactly two weeks had passed.

(‘Running into’ made it sound as if they bumped into each other at a coffee shop or that Lena had shown up to the bar or game night—something Alex said Lena was too busy for, even if the looks on everyone’s faces made it obvious that that was a lie.

Kara didn’t _run into_ Lena so much as she sought her out, feeling an inexplicable need to see her, talk to her, ask her why that photo in her drawer made her heart pound, ask why every mention of Lena’s name made breathing come a little easier.

She wanted to know who Lena was to her, why everyone avoided eye contact when Kara mentioned her, why Winn had practically shouted, “No!” and nervously fled after Kara had told him the other reporters kept asking about Lena and if anything was wrong as she hadn’t come by lately.

(She wanted to know what one of them meant when he said that James had explained the situation and that he hoped it would all work out.

She wanted to know _Lena_.)

Her footsteps were light as she landed on the balcony, feeling awkward and more than a little silly. Was this stalking? Would Lena appreciate her presence? After all, Lena could have easily sought her out over the past two weeks, couldn’t she?

Most of the lights of L-Corp had been dimmed, except the ones in Lena’s office, illuminating her figure under glaring bulbs and the bright screen of her computer. She was sitting at her desk, slouched slightly forward, an empty glass to her right, an untouched plate of food next to it. She didn’t even jump when Kara tapped lightly on the glass doors, merely turned around tiredly, the little sigh she let out audible even above the chattering of the city.

Not for the first time, Kara wondered if maybe she shouldn’t have come here at all.

She wasn’t given much time to second guess herself—Lena stood up and smiled stiffly, walking over to the glass doors barefoot (for the first time Kara noticed that Lena’s heels had been tossed aside), and slid it open, resting against the entryway, arms crossed over her chest.

“This isn’t really an entrance, Supergirl,” she said wryly, chuckling a little mirthlessly as she took in Kara’s expression.

(And the questions are at the tip of Kara’s tongue:

_Why are you blocking the entryway? Why are you so sad? Why did you choose Supergirl over your mother and Jack Spheer?_

And perhaps most importantly of all: _Who are you to Kara Danvers?_ )

“We didn’t have birds on Krypton,” Kara said, and judging by the look on Lena’s face, she hadn’t expected those words to come out of Kara’s mouth anymore than Kara did. “I mean,” she stuttered, feeling a little silly, “there was a lot on this planet I didn’t understand. But birds—” Kara rocked on her heels, still unsure in her suit, still feeling as if she was filling in for someone else, someone better—a Kara that was suited to the S and the heroics, a Kara that didn’t feel like an imposter in someone else’s role. “I wanted to fly away sometimes, especially in the beginning. I wanted to shoot into the sky and just…go. Higher and higher and maybe, unrealistically, I’d reach Krypton.” Kara let out a sigh and took a big step back, leaning heavily on the railing, eyes on the night sky. She could hear Lena’s heart beat steadily, noticed the little changes in her breathing, the slight trembling of her hands. All those signs, tacit confessions she could easily have read on Alex or even Winn, but with Lena—someone she _felt_ close to but didn’t even know—it was like a foreign language.

“Why are you telling me this?” Lena asked, drawing Kara’s eyes.

Kara found herself shrugging.

“I don’t know, honestly,” she said. “Have you ever just felt that something was wrong? Out of place maybe?”

“You thought you could fix that by telling me about birds?” Lena scoffed. And…

It hurt. Surprisingly, shockingly, _terribly_ , it hurt. The words hit Kara in the chest and left her breathless. It didn’t make sense, it shouldn’t have mattered to Kara what one person she didn’t even know thought, but somehow—it felt personal.

“You’re right, it was silly,” she managed, rising several inches into the air, regretting ever having come by L-Corp at all.

“No! Wait!” Lena grabbed Kara’s hand, stopping her from leaving. “I’m sorry, that was—it’s been a long few weeks. I’m sorry, Kara. _Of course_ I want to hear what you have to say, what you’re feeling.”

“I don’t—”

“—I know I haven’t acted like it, but we’re…well we’re friends,” Lena said, sounding strangled as the words escaped her, her fingers tightening over Kara’s hand. “You’re my friend, Kara,” she said, sounding firmer this time. “Please. Stay.”

And so Kara did.

x 

It became a regular thing.

(The spending time with Lena thing, not the confessing of strange feelings.

Feelings like the urge to tuck Lena’s hair behind her ear, to take her hand, to let out a tiny sigh of relief every time they hugged—as if she’d been drowning and Lena’s embrace was her first chance at fresh air.

Feelings like warmth when she thought of Lena’s smile.

Calm when she caught a whiff of Lena’s perfume.

Affection when Lena rambled on about whatever new L-Corp was working on.)

Spending time with Lena became a regular thing, ranging from late night chats on the balcony at L-Corp to brunches on the weekend, unable to help that swelling of her chest every time she managed to get Lena to laugh.

(“Glad you worked it out with Luthor, Ponytail,” Snapper had said one afternoon at work, out of the blue, with a knowing smile on his face before he went back to being a jerk.

“Does this mean the cat’s out of the bag?” Winn had asked at the bar one night while Lena was in the bathroom, groaning loudly before falling completely silent when Alex elbowed him hard in the side.

“At this point I think it’s best if we just told her,” she heard Alex whisper to J’onn at the DEO several days later, his response nothing but a grunt of disagreement.)

Considering the state of her luck lately—between the memory loss and everything that entailed—she should’ve expected everything to fall apart eventually. This time, however, she couldn’t blame Cadmus—the sabotage was of her own doing. Because three months after waking up without any memory of two entire years, Kara found she had feelings for Lena.

Or rather, she finally found that the missing piece, that gap that she’d been desperate to fill, was her feelings for her best friend, the second realization came crashing down leaving her feeling weightless and bright and _strong_.

The issue was, sadly, that Lena didn’t feel the same way.

x

“That’s not true!” Maggie said in between her laughter, attempting and failing to glare at Lena. “I wasn’t _happy_ about losing to you, but I’m not a sore loser. Alex, back me up.”

“Sorry babe, but you shouted a few times,” Alex said, raising her hands up in surrender before digging back into her pasta.

“A few times?” Winn cut in. “Is that what we’re calling ruining game night for _weeks_ now?”

“It was a minor thing—”

“Minor?” James laughed, shaking his head. “You refused to talk to Lena or Kara for a month. Said they were cheaters.”

“That’s not true,” Maggie said while Lena laughed and shook her head, “I was very sportsmanlike, I even apologized to Kara—Kara tell them,” she added, turning her head and frowning when she noticed Kara had gravitated from the living room to the kitchen. For a moment, everyone just stared at Kara in confusion, not catching their mistake until silence fell in the entire room, and everyone—from James to Lena—stared determinedly at their food.

“Kara,” Alex began, trailing off as she realized she had nothing to say. And she was right.

Should they apologize for having memories Kara didn’t? Should they feel guilty for laughing about things just because Kara felt left out?

Of course not.

“It’s fine,” she said, shrugging when Alex shot her a disbelieving look. “It _is_. I’m okay. Really. I mean—” She stopped, fiddled with her sleeve, and shook her head. “I mean, sure. It’s…not fun. But you said it was temporary. And it’s only been three months. And maybe eventually I’ll remember everything or maybe I won’t and I’ll—I’ll feel like this for a while, like…” She trailed off, not sure what she was even trying to say.

(She wanted to explain that nothing felt real to her. That everything was fragile and seconds away from being snatched right out of her hands. That she was tired of faking smiles when she didn’t understand the joke. That she was miserable because she didn’t know how she got to this point—that somehow she’d appeared at the finish line, with a job she loved and a stable night-life as Supergirl, but she had none of the preparation for what all that entailed, leaving her woefully ill-equipped.

She wanted to describe what it felt like to be _sure_ of her feelings for Lena, to be _sure_ that they had some sort of relationship, but be forced to watch as Lena put up walls and boundaries, as if fearful Kara would get too close.

But saying all that required words Kara didn’t have, so instead she floundered.)

“Like what, Kara?” Lena asked softly.

“Like I don’t belong.” _Again_ , she didn’t say. _Again_ , like back when she first landed and she had no one—not even her cousin—who could take away some of her pain and loneliness. _Again_ , like before the Danvers became her family and National City became her home and her friends became her driving force.

_Again,_ she didn’t say.

And yet somehow, she was sure they all heard her anyway.

x

It was four months after the accident that she found out she and James dated for a while.

(James reluctantly told the whole story after the truth came out one day at CatCo, one of the photographers who worked under James showing Kara a picture he’d taken back when Kara and James had ‘been a thing.’

“We tried it and it didn’t work out,” James had explained softly, smiling reassuringly. “It’s cool on my end, I got a _super_ friend out of it,” he joked.)

She figured that the knowledge of her failed romance with James was what triggered what felt like an attack. One minute she was staring at James, torn between wanting to ask him why it didn’t work out and wanting to apologize for something she didn’t even remember, the next, her head was aching, the world seemed to be spinning, and then…nothing.

_Bright, green, massive—_

She woke up to the lights of a sunlamp, her glasses set neatly on the table to her right, a jacket she recognized as Alex’s hanging from a chair. Over the aching of her head, she could hear whispers right outside her door.

“I was afraid of this,” J’onn was saying, sounding as serious as ever. “Lena and Winn found traces of a variety of synthetic kryptonite on the bomb remnants, any one of which could have caused the block.”

“Block?” Alex asked, and not for the first time, Kara wished the walls and doors weren’t lined with lead—she wanted to see her sister, wanted to lean on her strength.

“Kryptonite doesn’t just effect Kara’s physiology, it effects her psychology too. My best guess is that this particular form of kryptonite targets positive emotions, perhaps turns them down, much like red kryptonite turned everything bad up. The block on her memories is her own mind’s defense against the kryptonite, protecting the very things Kara holds dear.”

“But wouldn’t the kryptonite have worn off by now then?”

“Perhaps traces of it are still in her body. Perhaps the unstable nature of the synthetic kryptonite made it more potent. Either way, considering how she reacted to the revelation of her relationship with Mr. Olsen, I suggest we steer quite clear of any similar topic—in the interest of protecting Kara’s mind.”

A significant look must have accompanied his words because silence followed for a long moment, and then:

“Don’t worry, J’onn. I think Lena came to the same conclusion four months ago.”

x

She didn’t understand human idioms.

Why would one even contemplate crying over spilled milk? Why would tomatoes be in anyone’s eyes? Why would anyone wear a cat on one’s head? Or why anyone would want to swallow grass snakes?

(“They mean something to different people,” Eliza had said once, when Kara was in high school and was frustrated by the way some of her classmates chose to speak. After all, what was a cat doing in the bag in the first place? “It’s a testament to the variety of culture on our planet, to humanity’s creativity.”

“It’s _hard_ ,” Kara had complained, suddenly much preferring the languages she’d learned back on Krypton, the rigid structures and the hard and fast rules.)

She didn’t like human idioms. She’d made it a point to make sure everyone who knew about her secret also knew of her distaste for idioms. She’d scoff at Winn saying he could eat a horse, would roll her eyes if James mentioned rivers and drinking, would ignore Maggie’s comment about the straws and backs.

She didn’t care for needles in haystacks, didn’t much like peas or pods, and found the concept of nine clouds rather ridiculous.

But there was one…

Kara sat on the couch, pizza slice hanging limply in her hand, her focus on the way Lena was laughing as she teased James over his movie choices. She couldn’t help but think of the photo that was still hidden in the drawer of her nightstand, a photo she’d taken to looking at rather often—just to see a glimpse of that soft look on Lena’s face, something she hadn’t physically seen even once.

(She wondered if it was a sign that it was so easy to become friends with Lena, if it mattered that they went from strangers to best friends in the matter of weeks. She wondered if it was telling that after a long day, it was Lena she sought out—Lena who she turned to for comfort.

She wondered what it would take to make Lena look at her the way she’d looked at her in the photo.)

She didn’t much care for human idioms, but there was one…there was one she felt was rather relevant at the moment—one that Krypton had no comparable phrase.

She was…she was _head over heels in love_ with Lena.

Kara started at the thought, jumping violently enough that Alex turned to her with a raised eyebrow and Winn—well on his way to tipsy—laughed.

“Everything all right?” Lena asked, always so careful, so kind, so… _Lena_.

“Fine,” Kara squeaked, getting to her feet in a rush. “Totally _fine_. I just—deadlines. Snapper. Lack of pizza.”

“There’s pizza in your hand,” Alex pointed out, frowning now.

“What? That’s great! Um, one problem solved then.” She paused, looked over at everyone, carefully avoiding Lena’s eyes. “I’ll be back,” she said, dropping her pizza slice onto Winn’s plate, much to his glee, and practically rushing off. She took refuge in the bathroom, sliding down the wall and collapsing onto the ground with her head between her knees. It wasn’t as if the knowledge she loved Lena was _shocking_ or _unwelcome_. In fact, it made perfect sense, felt inevitable even. It was just that…

It was hard enough to hide that she liked her best friend as more than just a friend, now she had to hide that she’d fallen for her too, in between all the lack of memories and the feeling out of place all the time and the fear that one misstep could lead to permanent damage (J’onn’s warnings never quite far from her thoughts).

_Head over heels in love_ , what a stupid idiom. By far her least favorite—it didn’t even make sense.

“Kara? Are you okay?”

(It was Lena, of course it was. Because her best friend wasn’t aware of the feelings swirling inside Kara’s chest, the indecision between acting and risking a friendship as well as her mind and the fear of losing even more.

It was Lena, because Lena always seemed hyperaware of when Kara needed her—even if Kara wasn’t exactly sure that Lena’s presence would be the solution.)

“I’m…peachy,” Kara said sullenly, shifting a little so that Lena could squeeze in next to her. It must have been quite the sight: the CEO of L-Corp sitting on Kara’s bathroom floor looking terribly unperturbed by her circumstances and situation.

“You gave your pizza away, that’s the opposite of peachy for you,” Lena said, her joke falling flat when Kara just sighed and leaned her head back against the wall. Lena bumped her shoulder lightly with Kara’s. “Talk to me, Kara. What’s wrong?”

“I’m trying to decide if it would be worth it,” Kara said after a moment’s pause, turning her head to look at Lena. Her eyes were so…green?

_Bright, green_ , _and—_ no.

She was in her bathroom, not carrying a bomb over her head.

She was taking Lena’s hand into her own, thumb brushing over Lena’s knuckles, falling, falling, falling, but not from the sky.

“Kara,” Lena said, and that was it, all the push she needed—one word and the decision was made.

“It’s worth it,” Kara whispered, and she leaned the rest of the way in, pressing her lips against Lena’s.

(Bright, green, and momentous, her heart pounding away.

But there, rather than darkness, there was light.)

Lena’s hands clutched at the collar of Kara’s shirt, not letting her move too far away as Kara broke the kiss, wiping away the tears on Lena’s cheeks.

“Why would you do that?” she asked, not releasing her grip on Kara’s shirt, not letting her pull away—not that Kara wanted to in the first place. “J’onn—he said you’d never remember. He said it might just spread to your other memories if we weren’t careful. I-I can’t let you lose Alex or the Danvers.”

“Lena—”

“—I can’t do this, not to you. It would just be selfish and—”

“—Lena, stop—”

“—I’m just going to go—”

“Lena, I remember.”

Lena’s eyes searched Kara’s for the lie, hands moving from her shirt to her cheeks.

“What?”

“I remember,” she repeated, grinning widely, watching as that soft expression—the one from the photo—began to form on Lena’s face. “I think falling in love with you all over again did the trick.”

Lena didn’t laugh at Kara’s attempt at a joke—and Kara wondered if that was because she knew it was as far from a joke as it could possibly be—but when Lena tugged Kara towards her for another kiss instead, she figured she got a better deal.


End file.
